20

Earl thought, for a woman who had just left her husband and moved out of her house, Deborah Wisdom was incredibly cool. Look at her now. She wore a frilly white apron over a little black catsuit. There was something very Folies-Bergère about the outfit. Saint Hyacintha goes Las Vegas. Oh, yeah, thought Earl, sitting at the dining table in the Quail Run condo that Deborah had rented. Miss Deborah, she was the very definition of cool.

“I hope you like migas,” she said. Eggs scrambled with crumbled tortillas and cheese, topped with a red chile sauce. Black beans on the side. More tortillas. Rich black coffee with a hint of chicory.

“I love migas,” said Earl. And I love you.

“I’m really glad you could come for breakfast. I’m sort of embarrassed about being here.” She waved a hand—gated community, white as rice, all of that. “But I wanted to be somewhere Stuart can’t just come barging in. I gave all the guards at the security gate pictures of him. ‘Do not admit,’ I said.”

“He can tag along with somebody playing golf. You know that.”

Deborah nodded. “Sure, but this makes it a little tougher.” She wiped her mouth daintily with a napkin. “So, Earl, where’s that picture you wanted to show me?”

Earl pulled out the image of “Christina in the Desert” that young Ben had downloaded. “Ever see this?”

“Sure. It’s hanging in Stuart’s office at the house on Monte Sol.”

*

After the docs at St. Vincent’s had pronounced Sam A-OK, she’d called Lo, and together they’d rescued Harpo from the vet. Sam had spent what was left of the night at Lo’s. Lo hadn’t pushed her about the cause of the fire, for which Sam was grateful. The thought that she could have incinerated Johanna’s house, that she had almost killed herself and Harpo, made her cringe with shame. How could she have been so careless? Self-destructive?

At first, standing in front of Johanna’s after Lo dropped her off, Sam saw no evidence of the fire except for Johanna’s mattress and the upholstered chairs littering the grass. Inside she found Jesus Oliva sweeping up soot, washing windows.

Sam threw her arms around him. “Jesus! How can I thank you? You’ve saved my life twice now.”

“Anyone would do the same.” He tucked his head with embarrassment.

“They most certainly would not. Wouldn’t want to be responsible for me. Did you know that, Jesus? You save someone, you’re responsible for them forever. That’s what the Chinese believe.”

“That would be fine with me, Miss Sam.”

He was so sweet; Sam was glad Johanna had had him in her life. She reached out and touched Jesus’s shoulder. He smiled shyly, then said, “I think you want to let it air for a few days. Then maybe call the carpet-cleaning people.” Jesus didn’t ask her how the fire had started. He was a model of reticence and tact.

Victor Vigil had neither of those admirable qualities. He came rolling down the graveled driveway minutes after Jesus drove out to see about business of his own. At the sight of him, Sam’s paranoia stood up and saluted. Had Vigil been lying in wait, wanting to catch her alone? Standing out on the portal, she looked first right, then left. There were no neighbors close enough to hear her scream, should she have reason to scream.

“Detective Vigil, it’s you again.” She watched him make his way down the brick walk. “How can I help you today?”

He grinned. His gold tooth blinked in the sun. “Looks like you’re the one needing the help. I understand you set your house on fire?”

A flood of shame washed over her. Then she stuck her chin out. Maybe, she wanted to say. I don’t remember. How about you? Do you remember tossing it yesterday afternoon? Tearing the place six ways to Sunday? Did you find what you were looking for? Was that you, Detective Vigil? Do you want me to GO HOME!? To shut up? To leave things well enough alone? Or was it Jayvee or Sylvia? So far, my money’s on you, Detective Vigil. You’re the meanest. The scariest.

“I set my house on fire?” she asked. “What makes you think that?”

Vigil shrugged. “Fires, we get reports of all of them. Most we ignore, trash cans, y’know, stuff like that. But this one, the guys said it was a cigarette dropped in a chair? Well, it makes a person wonder.”

“Wonder what, Detective?”

He hitched up his pants. He was dressed in the same tired jacket and slacks he’d worn when he’d awakened her to tell her Johanna was dead. He was like a vulture, this man. Bad news, he was right on it. He lunched on other people’s pain.

“Well, you know, I wonder about the timing,” he said. “You come to town. Your mother kills herself. Then you almost burn yourself up. It’s interesting, you know?”

Sam felt her anger rising. She might be wary of this son of a bitch, but that didn’t mean she’d let him push her around. “Interesting, you think? Might your interest be a tad personal, Detective Vigil? Might it have something to do with your family’s history with this property?” There. She’d put it back at him.

Vigil had snake eyes. They didn’t blink. His mouth stretched wide, his lips thinned into a rictus of a grin. “You know, Miss Adams, an awful lot of stuff seems to be happening around you. It does make a person wonder.”

“Really?” She couldn’t keep the sarcasm from her voice.

He didn’t like that. “Let me tell you, girlie, northern New Mexico’s a funny place. In some ways, it’s still not part of the United States.” He spit into the yard, making a snail track on the dusty grass. “We got the law, hell, I am the law. But we’re a kind of throwback to the old days. The conquistadores. You know what I mean?”

Sam didn’t answer. But she didn’t look away, either.

“Yeah, now those were the days. A man was a man. Dudes rode in on big, strong horses, hombres in armor. Didn’t put up with any crap from anybody, especially not women.” Vigil spit again. Bull’s-eye, smack atop his earlier offering. “No women out here, back then. Except the squaws, of course, good for the one thing.” He paused. He seemed to be considering whether to continue or not.

Sam had had enough. She turned back toward the house. “I’m kind of busy here, Detective Vigil, straightening things, you know, after trying to burn my house down. Was there a reason you stopped by?”

“Yep. Wanted to tell you the meat wagon’s coming up from Albuquerque.”

The meat wagon. Of course. Carrying Johanna’s remains. She looked away so he couldn’t see her tears.

“Yep,” Vigil said. “Be here any minute. Sombra’s, that’s the funeral parlor you chose?”

Sam nodded, wordlessly.

“I thought so. Well, listen, anytime you want to come by the station, pick up her stuff, we’ll be waiting for you.” Then Victor Vigil hawked and spit again. Another bull’s-eye.

*

Earl had wanted to run right over to Stuart’s house to see this “Christina in the Desert” for himself. But Deborah had called, and Stuart was home.

“Wait,” she said to Earl. “We’ll do it later when he’s out playing golf.”

So Earl scooted down to the teen center to shoot some baskets with the kids who gathered there every morning. Deborah wasn’t the only one interested in working with the youth of Santa Fe.

When Earl got there, all the teenagers were gathered around Jesus Oliva. He was helping them design a mural they were going to paint on a bank building downtown.

“Que pasa?” said Jesus.

“Not bad,” said Earl, and the men slapped five.

Then the kids’ voices rose. They were arguing about who was going to be the featured player in the mural. The girls wanted Selena. The guys wanted the Barrio Boys.

“My money’s on the girls,” Jesus said. “Women are strong these days.”

Earl nodded, thinking of Deborah. Yes, indeedy. Little bitty woman using him to help her get what she wanted.

He knew that. He didn’t mind, not one bit. Let him be her vessel. Let her use him up. He was willing.

Jesus was leaning up against the side of one of his glory-colored vehicles, this one an ancient Mercury. “My girlfriend Estela’s maybe getting too strong,” he said. Earl pictured Estela, her dark curls, her pretty face. “I think Estela’s stepping out on me.”

“What makes you think that?”

“She’s got this new gold ring; it’s got a big square red stone in it, a garnet. She says a friend gave it to her.”

“A friend, huh?”

“That’s what I said. She said, if I didn’t trust her, I could go fuck myself.”

“Estela said that?”

“No, but, you know what I mean. She said, like trust me or forget it. But I know what I know. My cousin Pablito—he’s a busboy in the restaurant in the lobby of La Fonda, where Estela works—he said there’s been this old guy chatting her up. Hanging around. I’m going to find this guy, tell him to lay off. Call him out. Damn gringo turistas, they come here, throw their money around, think they own the town. I hate their guts.” Jesus punched his fist into the side of his Mercury. But softly. A painter needs his hands. And the Merc was a piece of art. “Find him, I’ll call him out.”

It was Earl’s own rash behavior that had caused him to be locked up in Raiford years earlier. He didn’t want his young friend Jesus going down the same path. “Hold on, man,” he said. “You’re sure he’s the one who gave Estela the ring?”

Jesus shrugged. “Estela says I’m confused, because I have so much going on in my life. I don’t know, man. Miss Johanna, my boss, has died. Her daughter, Miss Sam, came to stay in her house, and last night the house caught fire, and…”

“Whoa! Wait up. Did you say ‘Sam’?” How many women named Sam could there be in Santa Fe?

*

Sam had been about to head down the hill to Sombra’s Mortuary when Johanna’s phone rang. It was Antonio Pomodoro.

“A fire!” he exclaimed. “That’s terrible! What can I do to help you?”

Nothing, Sam said. Not a thing. Though, on the other hand, Lo was busy in court, and the visit to Sombra’s wasn’t something she relished doing alone….

“Give me the name of the place,” he said without skipping a beat. “Better yet, I’ll pick you up.”

*

When they got there, Johanna’s remains still hadn’t arrived. So, the business at the mortuary was relatively straightforward, until they got to the part about the urn….

The three of them sat in Delfina Sombra’s dark paneled office: Sam, Pomodoro, and Delfina, a sultry woman in navy. Elevator music purred while Sam paged through the funerary catalog.

Who’d ever thought there’d be such variety? First came the metal containers: silver, brass, brushed steel, chrome, nickel, copper, fourteen-, eighteen-, and twenty-four-karat gold. There was the china series: Wedgwood, Limoges, “Ming dynasty,” a little adobe chapel that resembled a cookie jar. Or one could choose to disguise her loved one as a humidor: teak, ebony, rosewood, mahogany, burled walnut, heart-of-darkness tulipwood, or the more rustic knotty pine. Then there were the sporting trophies: golf, bowling, basketball, tennis, croquet, polo, volleyball, shuffleboard, weightlifting, wrestling. Or the gamesplayer’s ashes could be placed in chess pieces, Scrabble tiles, checkers, Boggle squares, dominoes. Or name-your-own-fantasy: the dead could be ensconced in a replica of a workshop, a sewing machine, a fishing boat, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe.

Sam closed the catalog. “I’m having a little trouble here. I haven’t the slightest what sort of thing Johanna would have wanted.”

“Let’s think about her house,” Pomodoro suggested.

Sam closed her eyes and imagined Johanna’s living room, when it was still intact. “She did have a collection of Indian pottery. Several of the pots are black, dull-finished with shiny details. Do you know what I mean?”

“Maria bowls, probably,” said Delfina Sombra. “The work of Maria Martinez from Santa Clara Pueblo; they’re quite valuable. We could work with one of those.”

Then Sam remembered her friend Suzie from Stanford, and the death of Suzie’s mom. “What if I decide to scatter the ashes?” she asked.

“Then you don’t really need an urn at all. In that case, we can provide you a temporary container for the remains.”

It had been the seventies when Suzie’s mom had run her Corvette off Highway One. It had soared, then exploded on the beach below. Suzie swore that her mother had had premonitions of her death and had insisted that, when her time came, her ashes be scattered. The where of it she left in Suzie’s hands, which was unfortunate, for decision-making wasn’t Suzie’s strength.

Sam and Kitty, her roommate, had spent many an hour considering the possibilities with Suzie. Lots of folks flung their loved ones from a plane out over the Pacific, but given Mom’s death, that seemed redundant. Muir Woods? Off San Francisco’s Coit Tower? The Golden Gate? Not bad, but there was that Pacific thing again. Meanwhile Mom’s ashes languished in the trunk of Suzie’s MG, just in case she happened upon the perfect site.

After almost a year, it came to Suzie. She’d take Mom to a Dead concert—Mom had adored the Dead—and somehow finagle the ashes backstage to Jerry Garcia, who she was sure would oblige her by flinging Mom out into the crowd. Sam and Kitty weren’t convinced, but they did give Suzie points for daring. Whether or not she would have succeeded became a moot point when Suzie’s MG was stolen the night before the concert. The car was recovered about a month later, but Mom…?

“If scattering is what you choose, the temporary container is about this size.” Delfina’s hands outlined a half-gallon container. “A plastic bag inside a thick cardboard box.”

Yes, Sam said. Definitely. That would do it. Anything to get out of this room. Now.